Gunman who fired at Middlefield police said to oppose authority

MIDDLEFIELD, Ohio -- In the last moments of his life, James Gilkerson sprayed bullets from a semiautomatic rifle at two Middlefield police officers, a contrast to the man who cared for his ill mother, according to interviews and documents.

Gilkerson, 42, of Mentor-on-the-Lake, fired on two officers after a traffic stop shortly before 6 p.m. Sunday on Ohio 608, near Pierce Street. Before officers Brandon Savage and Erin Thomas could get out of their cruiser, Gilkerson had left his car and started shooting, authorities said.

The officers returned fire, striking and killing Gilkerson.

Exactly why Gilkerson unloaded at the officers is unclear, authorities said. But the attorney who represented him in a 2006 drunken driving conviction remembers him as a person who appeared to be anti-establishment.

"He was a hard person to figure out," said attorney David Patterson. "He just didn't like authority."

Thomas, 33, a former Woodmere officer, suffered serious injuries to her left hand. Shrapnel was embedded in her right wrist, and she suffered a gunshot wound to her left thigh, according to a police statement that did not name her.

She was listed in good condition Monday at MetroHealth Medical Center, where she had been flown by helicopter on Sunday, a spokeswoman said.

Savage, the other officer, suffered minor injuries to his left knee from flying fragments of the police car. He was released from University Hospitals in Geauga County.

On Monday, a sheriff's spokesman could not say why the officers stopped Gilkerson, what was in his car or where he was headed.

The police car had a shattered windshield and multiple bullet holes.

Mayor Ben Garlich said Thomas recently had been hired to the department. Despite her experience with Woodmere, he said, she was going through field training with Savage, which explains why two officers were in the car Sunday night. The department normally has one officer per car.

"He opened up on them," said Patrick Holmes, who heard the gunfire from his home on Ohio 608 and saw some of the shots. "The police officers didn't have a chance. No chance. They were getting out for a traffic stop, but he got out first."

Gilkerson did not have an extensive criminal past. The last time police in Mentor-on-the-Lake responded to a call to his home was in August 2012 when his mother had a stroke.

A person who answered a relative's phone said he cared for his mother, who had been ill. Several attempts to reach his family were unsuccessful.